Being Fully Human

"See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is."1John:3:1-3

For Centuries many philosophers, theologians, thinkers of every sort and even common people have pondered what it means to be human. 

Many have  rightly seen  that humans beings  are more than just  highly  "evolved" animals, there is something truly unique about us which sets us apart from the other life forms which inhabit this world. 

The Holy Scriptures endorses this special place which humanity has in the economy of life upon earth. That we are no random accident of a chaotic cosmos. There is truly intent and purposes for our existence in our lives ,as brief as they maybe compered to the eons of the creation around us, yet our place here means something and we are ever searching for the answer to who? what? we are and why we are.

 In God's Image

From the beginning of recorded human history and the creation epic found in Genesis we find the very  Creator God  actually speaking of his own divine purpose for creating humanity.

"Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”  So God created mankind in his own image,in the image of God he created them;male and female he created them." Gen:1:26-27

It has been understood that being in the "image and likeness" of God is more than shape or form but speaks to capacity  and that God himself has instamped his own characteristics upon and within humanity both male and female , it also is a declaration of God's divine intent and purpose for creating us. 

This tell us that being in the "image and likeness" of God is part of being human.  God,  how ever made humanity out of the resident materials  of the Earth, not composed of spirit,  demonstrating that human beings have a definite point of beginning ,  and though in God's "image and likeness"  we are not God , but created beings in need of their Creator to give us life and "form us" into his "image and likeness"

"Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being." Gen:2:7

This indicates to us ,that for us, each and all of us, that for humanity to be Fully Human as God intends means that we are to be in his "image and likeness" .

Eden

 This declaration of intent to make humanity into his "image and Likeness"  was given even before humanity was even formed , telling us that it issues out of God's own eternal purpose that he inaugurated even before the the cosmos was spoken into being, that is "in the beginning" which we would comprehend as eternity past. 

God places humanities' first parents within the confines of  the  Garden of Eden with all  provisions met, this is where the Creator God intended humanity to be in his "image and likeness"  ,that is , to be "fully human". God himself was there present and accessible to give then every advantage in the life he decreed for them.

The Scripture account in Gen:2:8-26, describes the Garden as well watered and filled with every good thing , a setting in which there was abundance and peace and  beauty. In this setting of rest and repose  God brought forth Eve out of the first man Adam and  presented her as his wife who shared in the very "image and likeness"  of God with Adam. 

Together they were to "dress and keep the garden" which means that their lives where to be a restful enjoyable responsible stewardship as  opposed to arduous difficult task of  survival.

This is the environment and condition, that of rest reposes , which truly allows humanity to be "fully human",  to be in the "image and likeness of God" . This is what God had always intended to be the experience and arena for the living out being fully human for humanity, yet even with all the advantages given by God's graciousness our first parents ,who in truth , represented all of what we might think of as ideal humanity failed. Gen:3:15

Adam the progenitor of  humanity , the best of all of humanity, who , even having access to the very God who created all things , and having no physical or mental impairments  chose wrongly and reached for the "Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil"  allowing sin to enter into the human experience and distorting the "image and likeness" of God in which they were created, they now were less than being "fully human". 

This choice of our first parents is sometimes called  the "Felix Lapsum" which means "the Happy Fall" or can be rendered the "Fortunate Fall".  

This, "Felix Lapsum" resulted in all humanity , in the persons of our first parents, removal from the Garden and has placed us in a condition to build our lives with a distorted "image and likeness" of our Creator. Humanity would have to struggle there would be no leisurely "dressing and keeping the Garden" , rather now ,  it would be by the "sweet of the brow"  and "work the soil" amidst "thorns and thistles"  .

Felix Lapsum

The Apostle  Paul address the address the result of Adam's choice and the ensuing "fall" of humanity in his Epistle to the Roman Christians.

"Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned—

To be sure, sin was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not charged against anyone’s account where there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses, even over those who did not sin by breaking a command, as did Adam, who is a pattern of the one to come." Rm:5:12-14

What Paul is articulating is this, if Adam, who was created personally by God's own hand and had complete access to the Creator had been given full disclosure  of all that he need to know and was the absolute best of humanity  could not make the right choice  how can any who come after do any better. The answer is we can't and have not done better. We all have sinned. 

All human history proves and justifies the Judgment of God to cosign all of us under the choice of Adam. How then,  can we look at this situation as  the "Felix Lapsum"  the "Happy Fall" ? This would seemed to deify human logic. But this view assumes  that God is looking for opportunity to condemn us not save us. That God is "reactionary" to the our condition.

But if we view God as a loving God who wants us to share in his "image and likeness" for eternity  it is in truth seen for our good, for it proves for all time and eternity that we can not save our selves , that we need someone to save us, to do what none of us could do, not even Adam who represent the best of us. This view understands that our God would have provisions for our atonement and restoration and and salvation. He himself would do it for us what none of us could ever do, he wold accomplish our salvation for us, for all humanity. This then, make it truly a "happy fall" for each and all who will but freely receive it, so that we might be "fully human" as God intended.

Thru Jesus

Paul explains this in Romans, that it is thru Jesus and his perfect obedience and  righteousness that   restoration and life is accomplished  for all , just  as,  in Adam sin and alienation and death came to all.

"But the gift is not like the trespass. For if the many died by the trespass of the one man, how much more did God’s grace and the gift that came by the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ, overflow to the many! Nor can the gift of God be compared with the result of one man’s sin: The judgment followed one sin and brought condemnation, but the gift followed many trespasses and brought justification. For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ!

Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people. For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous.

The law was brought in so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more,so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." (15-21)

That is , in Jesus God has restored the "image and Likeness" of himself to us, he  , God has made us human again , which means to be the bearers of his "image and likeness .

 Sin and alienation from God keeps us from being "fully Human" .

Jesus the Images of God

God thru his Son, the second person of the Holy Trinity,  has come in the person of Jesus Christ  and accomplished for all humanity what none of us could have accomplished. Jesus  in the incarnation , that is "God in the Flesh" , became one of us, that is human , but without any distortion to the "image and likeness" of God . Jesus was and is the human which God wants all of us to be, that we should perfectly be expressing his glory and holiness bearing his "image and likeness" .

"The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation." Col:1:15

Jesus was and is the perfect expression of Who God is and his glory.

"The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel that displays the glory of Christ, who is the image of God" 2Crth:4:4

Sharing Jesus' Sonship

Thru the message of the Gospel we come to believe and accept  Jesus' saving work for each and all us, as Paul wrote  "the Gospel is the power unto salvation". We enter into all that he as 

accomplished on our behalf, we see "the glory of Christ, who is the image of God"  .  When we see this truth that Jesus is the very Son of God,  then we are transformed becoming more like him, that is in our lives the "image and likeness" of God, which we all were intended to have is produced. This is what the ancient Church called "Deification"  it means,  becoming conformed to the image of Christ as Paul called on us to do. To become the humans being we all were meant to be from the beginning.

"For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters." Rm:8:29

Jesus has brought us into his very Sonship and has assigned  us to share all that is his.

"In bringing many sons and daughters to glory, it was fitting that God, for whom and through whom everything exists, should make the pioneer of their salvation perfect through what he suffered" Heb:2:10

As we focus on Jesus we grow up into him, becoming like him in his perfect expression of the "image and likeness" of God. 

 "until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ." Eph:4:13

 Jesus looks upon us as his true brethren who with him bear the "image and likeness"  of God .

"Both the one who makes people holy and those who are made holy are of the same family. So Jesus is not ashamed to call them brothers and sisters." Heb:2:11

Finally Fully Human

Jesus has taken on our very humanity and joined us to himself and he to us, he lived the life we live but only without sin , and always representing the perfect "image and likeness" of the Great God  in himself never distorting that image at any time in any way. Though being fully God he condescended to our lowly estate and joined us to him and in so doing elevated our humanity.  

"Jesus is unique in that only he is, and will forever be , Fully God and Fully Human we will only be Children of God , fully human"

Jesus even joined us in death, so that we might join him in life thru the resurrection which in truth only shows us what is true that he  is the Son of God. That in his resurrection we too might share in his glorified humanity. Paul calls this the "power of his resurrection" , that in the resurrection we become truly  "Fully Human" as God had purposed from before the dawn of Creation.

That when we enter Eternity thru the resurrection, we  are then "Fully Human" from which the flesh has thus far prevented us for experiencing to it's fullest . What this means is this,  we are not even yet this side of Eternity , "Fully Human", this will occur at the coming of our Lord when we will be transformed into the gloried state that our Lord Jesus Christ is even now clothed in. 

 The aged Apostle John on the Island of Patmos encounters the Glorified Jesus seeing him as he is.

"I turned around to see the voice that was speaking to me. And when I turned I saw seven golden lampstands, and among the lampstands was someone like a son of man, dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash around his chest. The hair on his head was white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, and coming out of his mouth was a sharp, double-edged sword. His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance". Rev:1:12-16

What Jesus now is,  is what humanity was always meant to be. Jesus shares with us his Sonship and as his brethren we will share also in his glorified humanity. John wrote of this a few years prior  his encounter with the Gloried Jesus.

"See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is."1John:3:1-3

 John is telling us, that,  at our entrance into Eternity we will Finally be "Fully Human" as God has always meant us to be.  In perfect expression of the very "image and likeness" of God. This is what it means to be "Fully Human" as our Lord Jesus is..Amen

Rev. Todd Crouch, Pastor 

The Fountain of Life Church a Congregation of Grace Communion
2101 Old National Pike.

Washington, Pennsylvania.   www.gcfountainoflife.org

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